Metra To Let Contractor Delay Delivery Of Promised Rail Cars

controversial $379 million contract to build and renovate rail cars to delay the start of the delivery, officials said.

Newly rehabilitated commuter rail cars that were supposed to be delivered to the transit agency starting at the end of November won`t have to be ready until next spring under a new schedule expected to be approved by Metra executives, officials said last week.

FOR THE RECORD - Additional material published Dec. 16, 1992:Corrections and clarifications.A story in Dec. 14 local news sections about a Morrison Knudsen Corp. plant rehabilitating rail cars for Metra incorrectly stated that the plant is hiring non-union workers. A company spokesman said the workers are being hired regardless of whether they are affiliated with a union, but there has been no vote to unionize at the plant. The Tribune regrets the error.

When Morrison Knudsen Corp. and its partners won the $379 million rail car contract, it was described as the largest awarded in the rail

transportation industry. And Gov. Jim Edgar and Mayor Richard Daley hailed it as one of the largest boosts to the sagging Chicago manufacturing sector to come about in years.

Transit spokesmen blamed the delays in delivery of the rehabbed cars on a lawsuit filed by Local 719 of the United Auto Workers this year that unsuccessfully challenged the method by which Metra awarded the contract to the firms. The local represents workers at Electro-Motive Division of General Motors in McCook, which had teamed with a Canadian firm. They were the unsuccessful bidder on the project, with a bid about $7 million higher than Morrison Knudsen`s.

A month after Metra signed the contract with Morrison Knudsen, its partner in Japan, and a minority-owned firm, a Cook County Circuit Court judge dismissed the suit.

Carole Travis, president of the local, said the agency was looking for a scapegoat in blaming the union`s lawsuit for the delays.

She said the union had always maintained that Morrison Knudsen couldn`t meet the delivery schedule it had submitted on the proposal. ``We always thought it was a fraudulent delivery date.``

Metra officials are also forgiving stiff $250 a day per car penalties that were to be levied under the contract should the cars not be delivered on time, Metra officials said.

Under the contract, the Morrison Knudsen partnership is to produce 173 new rail cars and rehabilitate 140 of the agency`s existing fleet.

Instead, Metra is permitting the contractor to deliver the first rehab car in April 1993. New cars, which will be wheelchair-accessible, were originally supposed to be delivered in September 1993, but won`t be available until March 1994, said Chris Knapton, a Metra spokesman.

Metra executive director Philip Pagano said there was also a problem with the Morrison Knudsen`s bond, which insures that should the contractor default the project will be completed. He said it also contributed to the delays on the project.

Morrison Knudsen is renovating a former General Motors plant in the Pullman neighborhood and is hiring non-union workers for the contract, said company spokesman Stanley Crow.